42.

Knock on the door.

Milo said, "Entrez-vous."

A Mutt-and-Jeff duo of female sheriffs stood over Lara Rieffen.

"Thank you, ladies, give this one the full strip-use that room across the hall."

The shorter cop said, "Will do, Loo."

He turned to Rieffen. "See you around, Lara? Or should we start using Kathy? For old times' sake."

Her reply was scalding eyes and a toss of strawberry blond.

The taller cop said, "I like your highlights. What do you use, L'Oreal?"

Stepping back inside, Milo removed his coat from the table, checked the mini-video-recorder he'd secreted under the garment. High-tech loan from Reed's half brother Aaron Fox, formerly an LAPD homicide D, now a Beverly Hills private eye with a penchant for toys.

A partial replay revealed clear images and sound. "Perfect. Except for those extra ten pounds, can't they invent a camera won't do that?"

Gloving up, he searched Rieffen's bag.

Inside were coroner's credentials, five photos of her and M. Carlo Scoppio wearing hiking clothes, backdropped by forest.

"She look intimidated to you?"

"Not in the least."

A wallet held a hundred twenty-three dollars in cash and some change, I.D.'s and credit cards under Lara Rieffen, Kathy Lara Vanderveldt, Laura Vander, Kathleen Rieffenstahl, Laura Rice, Cathy Rice, Lara Van Vliet.

A push-b.u.t.ton stiletto and a pepper-spray dispenser shared a zipped compartment with two tampons.

Milo said, "That cries out for wit, but I lack the energy."

A second pouch held a pair of opal earrings. He inspected the backs.

One was engraved.

D F.

"Trophy of the kill, poor Doreen."

Another pouch, deeper and secured by a snap, contained lip balm, breath mints, a single sheet of white paper, letter-sized, folded twice.

Four-month-old e-mail from [email protected] to

hey baby someone at the office put up one of those stupid posters today that affirmation for inner peace and I thought of you and made this up: KATHY AND MONTE C.'S SUPREME NEGATION (FOR OUTER CHAOS) I tell the truth. They lie.

I'm strong. They're weak.

I'm good.

They're bad.

that about sums it up, hey, babe? you want it you name it you the

bomb LOL love you forever continue to light my fuse

Irvin Wimmers showed up with two more tan uniforms. After a brief, happy chat with Milo, Wimmers and his team took Rieffen away, marching her through the crypt, cuffed, head-down, past stunned co-workers and Dave McClellan's look of utter contempt. When she pa.s.sed close to McClellan he made a point of directing a thumbs-up at Milo.

Rieffen looked up at him. Cobra disturbed from its nap.

I said, "Master manipulator."

"Lotta good it did her," said Milo.

"I was referring to you."

"Moi? I'm crushed." Grinning. "So how'd I do, Cecil B.?"

"You deserve a percentage of the adjusted gross and a big chunk of the marketing revenue."

"Hooray for Hollyweird-not that I really fibby-fooed."

"Perish the thought."

"Think about it: Monte will soon be in custody, I just got there a little early."

"I'll jump-start your election committee soon as we're back in the office."

"Once we get him, is there any doubt he'll turn on her? And Bobby did kind of talk to me. From the grave. That's a form of talking, right? And look, he was right, Bobby, I mean. I guess fibby-fooing about the gun was a little naughty, but I had to, I was so scared I'd never close the case, my boss can be so mean, when he yells at me it makes me feel bad. And hey, that worked, too, and now I can get hold of that nasty old gun and it won't be used to make anyone else dead, please tell me I'm a good person, Dr. Delaware."

I was still laughing when we reached the car.

He wasn't.

I said, "What's the matter?"

"Nothing's the matter, life is grand. I'm just focused on playing one-card Monte."

CHAPTER.

43.

Baird, Garroway and Habib, Attorneys at Law, occupied a triple-wide storefront on Soto, window gla.s.s painted black, promises of quick settlements in five languages emblazoned in bright yellow paint. As Reed had pointed out, walkable from the County Hospital complex.

S.A. Gayle Lindstrom said, "No need to chase ambulances very far."

She sat at the wheel of a Chevy sedan financed by federal income tax, wore a white tank top, tight jeans, wedge sandals. Hoop earrings sparkled. More makeup than her usual quick morning dab, including too much frosted pink lipstick.

Milo said, "New side of you, Gayle."

"I love being a girl."

He slouched in the front pa.s.senger seat. I had the rear to myself. The car was impeccable but it smelled of vanilla, as if someone had partied with cookie dough.

The man his employers knew as M. Carlo Scoppio had remained inside the law firm since arriving, save for a ten-minute smoke break out in the rear parking lot. No chance to take him as he puffed away; three other nicotine freaks indulged themselves close by.

Several times Scoppio had walked people on crutches to the firm's front door. A couple of the limpers actually seemed to be disabled.

At three p.m., when the roach coach honked "La Cucaracha," Scoppio wasn't part of the small crowd surging for snacks.

"Maybe he's brown-bagging," said Lindstrom. "Saving his hard-earned blood money for a rainy day."

Seven cops from the fugitive apprehension squad were positioned at various spots in the neighborhood. The location wasn't ideal for stakeout: Heavy traffic on Soto would make a quick dash across the street hazardous, and light pedestrian traffic killed the chance of sidewalk surveillance. The lot where Scoppio had smoked was blocked to the north by deeper buildings, one way in and out, a cracked driveway. To the east coiled a warren of residential side streets, to the west was the thoroughfare, freeway-close, the on-ramp in sight, raising the risk for a high-speed chase. Though at four thirty p.m., any lam artist would encounter b.u.mper-to-b.u.mper.

While Scoppio worked the wonderful world of personal injury, the house he'd shared with Lara Rieffen and Doreen Fredd got tossed by Moe Reed, Sean Binchy, and a Sheriff's crime scene tech.

No remnant of Fredd's residence, no blood beyond a few pinpoints under the bathroom mirror, probably shaving-nick spritz. No indication anything violent had ever taken place in the bungalow. The tech swabbed and pulled up prints and left.

Binchy and Reed found the gun box right where Rieffen had said it would be. Resting on top was a black plastic case housing the .22 S&W, serial numbers filed off but probably accessible chemically.

Binchy drove the gun to the ballistics lab. The final report would take time, but the a.n.a.lyst saw enough to opine that the bullets from Backer and Escobar came from the same weapon.

Reed's meticulous room-by-room produced an a.r.s.enal under the bed: three rifles, a shotgun, boxes of ammunition. Maybe Rieffen had been telling the truth about bad dreams.

Both her prints and Monte's showed up on the murder weapon. The longer-barreled gun inserted in Doreen Fredd's v.a.g.i.n.a could be any of several in the collection but a Charter Arms Bulldog did show up, fitting Dr. Jernigan's guess.

The top drawer of a desk in a spare bedroom held newspaper accounts of the lynx hair episode, along with Rieffen's med school acceptance letter, well thumbed. Baggies of prescription tranquilizers and crystals of what looked like methamphetamine showed up in a bottom drawer.

A pantry cupboard was filled with heavy-duty muslin bags crammed with packets of bills.

Reed calculated the total three times. $46,850.

"Checked both credit cards for expenditures since they got back from Washington, Loo. They've been to dinner three times, he's a bad tipper, total charges were $146.79. Nothing else substantial pops out on the cards, just a hundred or so in piddly charges. But I did find some matchbooks from three Indian casinos in his nightstand, so that could account for the rest."

"You're slipping, Moses."

"Sir?"

"Those dinners, what'd they eat for dessert?"

"Hopefully humble pie, Loo."

At four fifty-six p.m. two middle-aged Hispanic women in casual clothes rode away from the law firm in a battered Nissan, followed by a younger blonde, identified as Kelly Baird Englund, daughter of the senior partner and a lawyer herself, in a powder-blue Jaguar convertible. Seconds later, Daddy Bryan Baird, corpulent in a bad blue suit, waddled to his black Mercedes. Ed Habib, in no better haberdashery, steered his black Lexus LX haphazardly while talking on the phone, followed by Owen Garroway, patrician in pinstripes, handling his black Porsche Cayman with aplomb.

"Black's the new black," said Gayle Lindstrom.

No sign of Carlo Scoppio and that hadn't changed by five fifteen.

Lindstrom fidgeted. "Maybe he tried to contact Rieffen, couldn't reach her, somehow found out she was in lockup."

Milo said, "She was brought straight to High-Power. Wimmers handled it himself."

"I'm just saying."

"Keep doing that, Gayle."